At least once in our life, most – if not all – of us have experienced listening to music with someone by sharing our earphones. Some people don’t like sharing an earphone because, for starters, the practice doesn’t seem too hygienic, and there is also the whole issue of playing songs that both listeners like. For the cleanliness part, we can only recommend keeping your ears clean, but technology can now solve the other problem quite easily, as long as you have an iPhone. The newly released Splitr app is a music player that can play two tracks from your phone’s media library simultaneously. The great thing about this is that the audio for one song is directed to one earbud of the earphones, while the other one plays the second track. Apart from sharing earphones, Splitr can also come in handy if you want to mash-up two of your favorite songs in an uncomplicated manner.

Splitr is not the first iOS app to come out with a unique focus on music playback via earphones. In the past, we have seen Awareness, which makes sure users are never completely isolated from their surroundings while listening to music. In our opinion, Splitr is even more useful compared to Awareness and many other third-party music players for iOS. The app has a simple interface, and no needless buttons to speak of.

The main screen is divided into two halves. The top half controls music for the right side of the earphone, while the bottom half is for the left bud. To pick a song for each side, tap the first icon for the appropriate half, which takes you to the music library on your phone. The name of both selected songs and their artists are shown at the top of each half. Splitr offers separate playback controls for each side. These controls include pause/play, stop and a volume slider. The playback continues in the background and on the lock screen.

Splitr seems like an app that is too good to be true, and maybe that is why it has a rather large shortcoming. You cannot listen to playlists using this music player, and every time a song ends, a new one always has to be loaded manually. Still, Splitr is great for a free app, and we are hoping the developer will add playlist support in the future. The app is display-optimized for iPhone and iPod touch, but can work with the iPad as well.